Box is launching a new offering aimed squarely at government customers in an attempt to get more public agencies to use its file storage and collaboration service.On Thursday, the company launched Box for Government, designed to make it easier for government organizations to deploy Box for their employees. That announcement was timed with Box receiving provisional authority to operate under the Federal Risk and Authorization Management program (better known as FedRAMP), a sign that the company meets key requirements for handling government data.The government push is an important move for Box, which has been positioning itself as a cloud storage and content services provider focused on serving large organizations like public agencies and enterprises. Its FedRAMP Moderate certification meets a bar set to protect types of data that include personally identifiable information. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
LAS VEGAS -- Cyber insurance can pay out millions of dollars to cover the cost of data breach liability, but buying the policies can be a nightmare for info security pros, and premiums for similar coverage can vary wildly, an Interop audience was told.
On the flip side, the insurance companies lack underwriters with IT knowledge, a good model for assessing risk, a common vocabulary to discuss policies clearly, and face a looming threat that a single successful attack of just the wrong kind could mean a major financial hit, says Dave Bradford, co-founder and chief strategy officer at Advisens.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Apple has released a new version of its Xcode development tool in order to patch two critical vulnerabilities in the Git source code management client.The Git vulnerabilities, CVE‑2016‑2324 and CVE‑2016‑2315, have been known since mid-March and can be exploited when cloning a repository with a specially crafted file structure. This allows attackers to execute malicious code on systems where such cloning operations were initiated.Xcode is an integrated development environment (IDE) used by a large number of developers to write applications for OS X and iOS. It includes a package called the OS X Command Line Tools for Xcode that contains the open-source Git client.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
More than half of all DDoS strikes have resulted in some kind of customer data loss, intellectual property theft or disappearance of money, according to a new report from Neustar.It’ll happen again, too. The IT firm also discovered that the vast majority of organizations (82 percent) are attacked again after the first DDoS onslaught.“DDoS attacks continue to pose a legitimate threat as a dangerous weapon used to create chaos and hold organizations hostage,” Neustar says in the report.Not many are “spared,” the security outfit says, and almost half of those blitzed once were thrashed six or more times.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The Internet of Things is growing so fast, it’s an obvious place to look for career growth.IoT is already a reality at 29 percent of enterprises, according to a Gartner survey taken late last year. Fourteen percent said they would implement it this year, and 64 percent said they plan to use some form of IoT eventually.Yet, like a lot of IoT technology, jobs in this vast field are still evolving out of what's been in place for years. Instead of aiming for a whole new job, the best strategy may be to add some skills to the ones you already have.There will be plenty of new things to do in enterprises that adopt IoT systems, which can make companies more efficient and generate new sources of revenue. And some people are working on IoT full time. But for now, most companies heading in that direction are still scouting it out.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Hyperconvergence is a relatively new buzzword but Westborough, Mass.,-based Simplivity is already boasting of creating version 3.0 of this emerging IT model. In this installment of the IDG CEO Interview Series, Simplivity CEO Doron Kempel talked with IDG US Media Chief Content Officer John Gallant about how Simplivity’s OmniStack outperforms competitors like Nutanix and claims customers deploying workloads on Simplivity can save 22% to nearly 50% compared to running them on Amazon Web Services. Kempel also talked about Simplivity’s partnerships with Cisco, VMware and Lenovo and explored why it took nearly four years to bring the company’s vision of hyperconvergence to reality. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Tens of millions of stolen credentials for Gmail, Microsoft and Yahoo email accounts are being shared online by a young Russian hacker known as "the Collector" as part of a supposed larger trove of 1.17 billion records.That's according to Hold Security, which says it has looked at more than 272 million unique credentials so far, including 42.5 million it had never seen before. A majority of the accounts reportedly were stolen from users of Mail.ru, Russia's most popular email service, but credentials for other services apparently were also included.Hold discovered the breach when its researchers came across the hacker bragging in an online forum. Though the hacker initially asked Hold for 50 rubles for the initial 10GB stash -- that's equivalent to about 75 cents -- he eventually turned it over to them in exchange for likes and votes for him on social media.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Famous people have app ideas, too...Image by Gotta Go!...and sometimes they happen to be pretty freakin’ brilliant.From Tom Hanks to Snoop Dogg, here’s what happens when famous people make an iOS app we can’t help but love.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Over the past seven years, the federal government has established a set of incentives and fines — carrots and sticks — to promote and expand the use of healthcare information technology, particularly the meaningful use of electronic health record (EHR) systems.In a recent report, PwC's Advanced Risk & Compliance Analytics practice found that due to the government's carrot and stick, EHR implementation initiatives usually concentrated on the core challenge of meeting tight timelines while managing costs. After all, these initiatives are often the largest projects these organizations undertake.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
It looks as though Cisco Executive Chairman John Chambers is really getting into this commercial drone stuff.
We wrote in late March that the former longtime Cisco CEO had invested an undisclosed amount in a hot startup called Airware that promotes itself as providing "the operating system for commercial drones." Chambers, who also joined Airware's board, was quoted at the time saying: "The commercial drone industry is poised to throw many markets into transition."
Now we see that Chambers was among the speakers kicking off this week's Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International's big Xponential 2016 conference in New Orleans.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
NASA said that for the first time it has demonstrated that a wireless system can communicate – sending route options and weather information for example -- with a jet on the ground.NASA said it tested a demonstration system known as Aircraft Access to System Wide Information Management (SWIM), to wirelessly send aviation information to an FAA Bombardier Global 5000 test aircraft taxiing 60 to 70 miles per hour on the Cleveland Hopkins International Airport runway. They sent the information over a prototype wireless system called Aeronautical Mobile Airport Communications System, or AeroMACS, developed by Hitachi.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
May the Fourth be with youImage by Flickr/Josh HallettMay 4 is International Star Wars Day, the unofficial holiday where we celebrate the Force, X-wings, Ewoks and women wearing their hair in the shape of their favorite breakfast pastries. But how do you give your week that particular galaxy-far-far-away flavor? Some suggestions follow.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
For most retailers, the time between Thanksgiving and Christmas is the holiday rush. For 1800Flowers, it’s Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day.Complicating efforts in recent years has been the venerable online flower shop’s extended reach: The parent company acquired the Harry & David brand 18 months ago, which 1800Flowers CIO Arne Leap called a “watershed moment.”“We had a real need to change our order management to support omni-channel, and tie together our commerce platforms,” Leap said of the new combined companies.Through a partnership with IBM, 1800Flowers went to the cloud.+MORE AT NETWORK WORLD: 25 Mother's Day gifts with geek appeal +To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
All blogs hosted on Google's blogspot.com domain can now be accessed over an encrypted HTTPS connection. This puts more control into the hands of blog readers who value privacy.Google started offering users of its Blogger service the option to switch their blogspot.com sites to HTTPS in September, but now that setting was removed and all blogs received an HTTPS version that users can access.Instead of the "HTTPS Availability" option, blog owners can now use a setting called "HTTPS Redirect," which will redirect all visitors to the HTTPS version of their blogs automatically. If the setting is not used, users will still be able to access the non-encrypted HTTP version.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
LAS VEGAS -- Visibility is key to troubleshooting network woes, but getting such access can be expensive. To help out, a veteran networking pro shared with attendees of the Interop conference in Las Vegas his list of a dozen mostly free “killer” tools.
Network Protocol Specialists owner Mike Pennacchi: Free tools can be customized to fit your needs
“There are commercial tools that do most of these functions,” says Mike Pennacchi, owner and lead network analyst at Network Protocol Specialists. “If you don’t have any budget, this gives you the tools without spending a lot of money.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Currently averaging 5 out of 5 stars on Amazon (read reviews), Robin has been discounted through May 10th by 25%. With a list price of $399, this item is discounted by $100 and can be purchased via Amazon right now for $299. Robin was born from a Kickstarter campaign (over $1.3M raised from 3,611 backers), and a desire to create something that uniquely stands out. This very well designed smartphone merges 32GB of onboard storage with 100GB of cloud storage, seamlessly backing up your apps and photos into intelligent archives that can be restored instantly and effortlessly. It features a 5.2" 1080p LCD with Gorilla glass 4, 13 MP rear Camera with phase detection Autofocus and Dual tone flash, and Dual Front facing speakers with Dual amplifiers. Learn more about the discounted Nextbit Robin unlocked smartphone and explore buying options on Amazon now.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
SharePoint is going mobile in a big way. Microsoft announced a new app for its content management and collaboration platform on Tuesday, which will give workers a way to access content from their smartphones and tablets on the go. The app, called SharePoint Mobile, will be coming to iOS by the end of June, and is one of dozens of new features for the platform that Microsoft announced alongside the general availability of SharePoint Server 2016. Other capabilities include redesigned team sites that make it easier to see relevant files that people are working on and a hybrid search functionality that works across cloud and on-premises versions of SharePoint. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Greenwave Systems is sort of the BASF of Internet of Things: It doesn’t make the IoT products you buy, it makes them better. Greenwave (one of Network World’s recently named IoT Companies to Watch) provides software and services that help consumer-facing companies like Verizon deliver IoT features to their customers. IDG US Media Chief Content Officer John Gallant talked recently to Greenwave’s Chief Scientist, Jim Hunter, about how the company is empowering IoT applications and how new voice and social-media-driven capabilities will change the market. Hunter also explored the evolving IoT market and offered a candid assessment of how data ownership and security issues could hamper the IoT revolution.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Interop 2016The 30th version running this week in Las Vegas features a trade show with more than 160 vendors displaying their wares and where its interoperability mission ventures far outside the show’s signature InteropNet Demo Lab. This year it is focused on promoting interoperability among Internet of Things devices, a category of gear unheard of that first year. (See Network World's preview story of the show.)To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Apple CEO Tim Cook still sees great potential in the Chinese market despite a drop in its revenue from the country in the first quarter.In an interview to Jim Cramer of CNBC's Mad Money program, Cook said Monday that the middle class in China is expected to boom from 50 million people five years ago to almost 500 million in the next five years. “This is an unprecedented growth of the middle class,” said Cook, adding that he “could not be more optimistic about China.”To a question from Cramer, Cook said it was an error by him not to to mention the figures about the burgeoning Chinese middle class during the company’s recent earnings call.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here